The High Court has refused an application by Neil Moore to add a challenge to a Dublin City Council housing decision to his judicial review proceedings, ruling that the proposed amendment came outside the applicable time limit and that no explanation for the delay had been offered.
Mr Justice Max Barrett delivered the judgment on 5 May 2017. The application concerned the Council’s 23 February 2016 refusal to consider Mr Moore for a two-bedroom vacancy under its Choice-Based Letting Scheme. The Council’s email said he was listed as a single applicant and was therefore not eligible for that vacancy.
Mr Moore was already seeking judicial review relief concerning a separate Council decision dated 24 March 2016. That decision said his children were recorded as “access children” and he would be considered for one-bedroom accommodation. The Council maintained that the March communication was not a freestanding decision, but an affirmation of an earlier one. The judge said that issue did not need to be decided on this application.
The proposed amendment would have added a request to quash the February decision and related changes to the statement of grounds. Mr Moore’s counsel argued that no extension of time was needed because the February decision was already mentioned in the original statement of grounds, and relied on a court rule allowing relief that had not been specifically claimed. The Council opposed the amendment, arguing, among other things, that it was late, would require it to meet a different case and concerned a distinct decision.
The judge held that mentioning a decision as part of the procedural history did not itself amount to seeking leave to challenge it. The application to add the challenge was outside the time limit. Because Mr Moore did not consider an extension necessary, he had offered no justification for the delay. The judge also noted that the relevant decision was known when the original application was made and that no lawyers’ error had been pleaded.
The proposed challenge concerned a different matter from the existing challenge and would significantly enlarge the case, the court found. The rule cited by Mr Moore did not provide a general power to permit an out-of-time amendment to judicial review grounds. The court therefore refused the application to add the certiorari relief and related amendments. It did not determine the merits of either housing decision, and Mr Moore’s existing judicial review proceedings could continue.